Police Get a Deal on Autos in Drug Bust
Standing near 13 vehicles seized from suspected drug buyers at MacArthur Park and two other downtown neighborhoods, Los Angeles Police Chief Daryl F. Gates quipped Monday that more and more he feels “like a used car salesman.”
“This effort is designed to get at the users and to get at them in the hardest possible way--by repossessing a valuable piece of property,” Gates said.
The Los Angeles Police Department and the FBI arrested 51 people--including a stockbroker, an accountant, an actress and parents of two children, ages 4 and 5--in a two-day operation against suspects seeking to buy small amounts of cocaine and marijuana at street-corner drug “supermarkets.”
Although most of those arrested were released on their own recognizance, their cars--43 in all--were confiscated. The seizures bring to 844 the number of vehicles, valued at $4 million, confiscated by the LAPD since the program began in January, 1988.
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